Law professor fires back at song-swapping lawsuits

BOSTON (AP) - The music industry's courtroom campaign against people who share songs
online is coming under counterattack.

A Harvard Law School professor has launched a constitutional assault against a federal copyright law at the
heart of the industry's aggressive strategy, which has wrung payments from thousands of
song-swappers since 2003.

The professor,Charles Nesson, has come to the defense of a Boston University graduate
student targeted in one of the music industry's lawsuits. By taking on the case, Nesson hopes to
challenge the basis for the suit, and all others like it.

Nesson argues that the Digital Theft Deterrence and Copyright Damages Improvement
Act of 1999 is unconstitutional because it effectively lets a private group - the Recording
Industry Association of America, or RIAA - carry out civil enforcement of a criminal law. He also says
the music industry group abused the legal process by brandishing the prospects of lengthy and costly
lawsuits in an effort to intimidate people into settling cases out of court.

Nesson, the founder of Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society, said in an interview that his goal is to
"turn the courts away from allowing themselves to be used like a low-grade collection agency.
"

Nesson is best known for defending the man who leaked the Pentagon Papers and for consulting on the case against
chemical companies that was depicted in the film "A Civil Action." His challenge against the music
labels, made in U.S. District Court in Boston, is one of the most determined attempts to derail the
industry's flurry of litigation.

The initiative has generated more than 30,000 complaints against people accused of sharing songs
online. Only one case has gone to trial; nearly everyone else settled out of court to avoid damages and limit the
attorney fees and legal costs that escalate over time.

Nesson intervened after a federal judge in Boston asked his office to represent Joel Tenenbaum, who
was among dozens of people who appeared in court in RIAA cases without legal help.

The 24-year-old Tenenbaum is a graduate student accused by the RIAA of downloading at least seven songs
and making 816 music files available for distribution on the Kazaa file-sharing network in 2004. He
offered to settle the case for $500, but music companies rejected that, demanding $12,000.

The Digital Theft Deterrence Act, the law at issue in the case, sets damages of $750 to $30,000 for each
infringement, and as much as $150,000 for a willful violation. That means Tenenbaum could be forced to
pay $1 million if it is determined that his alleged actions were willf